Mixed performance for Tech Valley Patent Index

The Tech Valley Patent Index for the fourth quarter climbed, with 558 patents issued, compared to 542 in the third quarter, according to Hoffman, Warnick & D’Alessandro LLC, an Albany-based intellectual property law firm, which compiles the data.

The regionwide index was down from the 588 it reached a year ago.

In the Capital Region, the index fell to 161 from 190 in the third quarter and 207 a year ago. The local figures include patents received by General Electric Co. Without those, the Capital Region index fell to 69 from 90 in the third quarter and 79 a year ago.

Spencer Warnick, a partner in the law firm, said the decline in Capital Region patents mirrors a national trend.

A separate survey from Wolters Kluwer Health found that patents nationwide fell 9.5 percent in 2007 from the year before.

The company’s IFI Patent Intelligence said 157,284 patents were granted during the year, while the U.S. Patent Office faces a backlog of 1.1 million applications.

The regionwide index includes patents awarded to IBM, which is based in the lower Hudson Valley. Without IBM, the number of patents increased to 270 from 262 in the third quarter, but was down from 302 a year ago, according to the figures from Hoffman, Warnick & D’Alessandro.

Nationally, IFI said IBM remained the top patent recipient, as it has for the previous 14 years, with 3,148 patents, down more than 500 from 2006. Samsung was second, Canon was third, Matsushita was fourth and Intel Corp. ranked fifth.